The DCIM Opportunity for Resellers, Explained and Four Reasons Why Your Customers Need it Now

For many, Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) software seems like an unexplainable black box. Software is very different from what many partners are used to selling and the truth is, we sell what we are comfortable selling. If we don’t understand something well enough to have an informative conversation with our customers, we probably won’t bring it up. The reality is that by not bringing it up, you may be doing your customers, and yourself a disservice.

Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) software and Schneider Electric’s StruxureWare specifically, can operate as the brains of your customers’ IT department. Taking over time consuming of often-tedious tasks, DCIM can help eliminate the margin for human error and prevent accidental downtime.

A popular misconception is that DCIM is only for large enterprises. The name itself even suggests that by including the tern Data Center. But the reality is that DCIM can help any organization with a distributed infrastructure by providing centralized monitoring and management of the entire IT infrastructure. Think about your customer base – how many of them have multiple sites? What about multiple closets within the same building? The truth is DCIM is appropriate for any organization that has more than one site to manage.

So what’s the opportunity? In a nutshell – Because DCIM tackles many of your customers’ most vexing challenges — optimizing efficiency, securing uptime, and avoiding capacity constraints — which enables them to focus on their core business rather than worrying about managing and operating their IT infrastructure. Here are four reasons your customers need DCIM:

#1 – Lower Costs

Who doesn’t like the sound of that? The growing IT demands which organizations are facing often translate to increased capital and operational expenses. However, DCIM offers management tools that simplify the daily tasks of IT staff, creating operational efficiencies and freeing up valuable human resources to focus on new initiatives rather than maintaining daily operations. Plus, remote management capabilities reduce the need for on-site staffing.

#2 – Prevent Downtime

Human error is the main cause of downtime in small to medium sized businesses. Frequently, those errors are the result of poor documentation of IT infrastructure. Manual processes open the margin for error. DCIM can reduce unintentional downtime by providing automating processes and providing a holistic view of the IT infrastructure making it easy to identify equipment that is not operating within normal parameters or on the brink of experiencing a failure.

#3 – Make Informed Decisions

It’s not uncommon for organizations to stick a new server in a certain rack just because there is adequate rack U space to accommodate it. But, can the UPS supporting that rack handle the additional load? What about the added heat? Can the cooling infrastructure remove it? DCIM helps IT professionals avoid hot spots or overloading a UPS by addressing common issues for IT operations, like where to locate new hardware or how to populate racks when changes are made.

#4 – Speed up Infrastructure Changes

Normally, every operations team has to build in extra time for deployment, testing, and certification of any changes or additions. This can take weeks, or even months, resulting in wasted project time. DCIM speeds up this process by modeling the changes in near-real time.

To help position StruxtureWare and DCIM to your customers and explain the many benefits to them, Schneider Electric has put together a brochure for partners. On February 26th, Domenic Alcaro, VP Data Center Solutions for Schneider Electric, hosted the live webinar, “Adding DCIM to Your Portfolio – What’s in it for You and Your Customer?” Click Here to register for the on-demand event.